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U.S. Department of Transportation U.S. Department of Transportation Icon United States Department of Transportation United States Department of Transportation
FHWA Highway Safety Programs

Executive Summary

The Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP) is a core Federal-aid highway program with the purpose to achieve a significant reduction in fatalities and serious injuries on all public roads. Under the Fixing America's Transportation System (FAST) Act, Congress authorized up to $2.4 billion per year for States to achieve this goal through the implementation of highway safety improvement projects. The States not only met this challenge, but far exceeded it obligating nearly $4 billion for over 4,400 highway safety improvement projects in 2016.

These highway safety improvement projects come in all shapes and sizes. Some HSIP projects are much bigger in scope than others, while other projects include countermeasure installations across multiple sites. The 2016 HSIP National Summary Report provides an aggregate summary of the type and cost of projects across all States. Provided below are highlights of the States' 2016 HSIP implementation efforts.

  • Most States have intersection (30 States) and roadway departure (29 States) programs.
  • States continue to use crash frequency and crash rate to identify projects in a majority of their safety programs.
  • A majority (roughly 63 percent) of HSIP projects cost less than $500,000 each, with 25 percent of all projects costing less than $100,000.
  • About 24 percent of HSIP projects would be considered high cost, coming in at over $1 million each. These projects often include widening shoulders, installing cable barrier, adding auxiliary lanes, or other miscellaneous intersection geometry and roadway projects.
  • Projects associated with a functional class were most often categorized as rural major collector or other urban principal arterial.
  • Projects on rural principal arterial freeways and expressways had the highest average total cost per project of $2.4 million, whereas projects on rural local roads or streets had the lowest average total cost per project of $475,000.
  • There are fewer urban projects than rural projects but the average total cost per project of the urban projects is greater than the average total cost per project of the rural projects.
  • About 70 percent of highway safety improvement projects occur on roads owned by the State Highway Agency.
  • Projects on roads owned by City or Municipal Highway Agencies had the highest average total cost per project of $1.6 million, while State Highway Agencies had the third highest average total cost per project of approximately $1.2 million. Projects on roads owned by State Park, Forest, or Reservation Agency had  the lowest average cost at just under $32,000.
  • A majority (67%) of highway safety improvement projects falls into the following categories: roadway, intersection traffic control, intersection geometry, roadside, and roadway signs and traffic control.
  • On average, States obligated 38 percent of HSIP funds to address systemic safety improvements.
  • Advanced technology and ITS, shoulder treatments, and alignment have the highest average cost per project; whereas parking, roadway signs and traffic control, and non-infrastructure projects have the lowest average cost per project.
  • States use HSIP funds to address the predominant infrastructure-related crash types – roadway departure, intersection, and pedestrian crashes.

While the spending patterns don't change much form year to year, the number and cost of HSIP projects has continued to increase. There were 1,684 projects with a total cost of $1.61B in 2009 compared to 4,468 projects with a total cost of $4.03B in 2016. Over the past eight years, States obligated $20.6 billion for more than 24,000 highway safety improvement projects. Based on a sample of 2016 HSIP projects, FHWA estimates that the benefits of the HSIP outweigh the costs on a scale ranging from 4.4 to 6.5.